Bacterial Leaf Scorch
Leaf margins go brown and dead in late summer while the middle of the leaf stays green, with a narrow yellow or reddish band along the line between the two. It returns to the same tree every year and works outward through the crown, which is how it differs from ordinary drought scorch.
Disease checklist
Four things to look for. If most of them match what you are holding, you are in the right place.
What gets rid of it
Gentlest option first. For most backyard cases the first one is enough, so try these in order and stop as soon as it works. If you do spray something, the product label tells you how — please read the notice further down.
1Confirm with a lab test
Send a sample to a state plant diagnostic clinic in late summer. You cannot separate it from drought damage by eye.
Try this first2Water in drought
Deep soaking during dry spells will not cure the tree but it slows the decline.
soaker hose3Prune out dead wood
Remove dead and clearly failing limbs to keep the tree safe over anything you care about.
4Do not expect a cure
There is no treatment. Antibiotic trunk injections by an arborist only mask symptoms for a season and have to be repeated every year.
5Plan the replacement
Infected trees decline over years, so choose and plant a successor nearby before the old tree has to come down.
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Which plants get bacterial leaf scorch
Every plant we cover that gets bacterial leaf scorch, grouped by type — tap any one to open its page. A note beside a plant came from that plant’s own entry, because the same disease can be a minor nuisance on one plant and a serious problem on another. Plenty of plants we do not cover get it too.
When to treat
Get a lab confirmation in late summer before spending money on the tree, because drought scorch looks similar and drought scorch is fixable.
Timing only — the label is the law
This page tells you when to watch for bacterial leaf scorch and when treating is worth considering. It is not a recommendation to apply any particular product. Read and follow the product label before you spray — under federal law the label is the legal instruction, and using a pesticide against it is illegal.
- Check the pre-harvest interval. Every product that’s cleared for an edible crop sets a minimum number of days between spraying and picking. Find it on the label before you spray anything you intend to eat.
- Check the re-entry interval before you or anyone else works in the treated area again, and use the protective equipment the label names.
- Confirm the product is registered for your crop in your state. This page groups many different crops together, and a product legal on one of them is not legal on all of them — state registrations differ too. Your state pesticide agency or local extension office can confirm both.
- Rates and mixing instructions come from the label, never from us. We don’t publish them because they differ by product and formulation.
Other problems on the same plants
If a plant gets bacterial leaf scorch, these are the problems it most often gets as well, so they are worth checking for while you are out there. They tend to appear together; one does not cause another.